I recently heard the average American has moved five times in their lifetime (living in three separate apartments and two single-family homes most typically). I heard this statistic less than an hour after Fred Baby pointed out that we’ve moved five times in the past seven years. Which got me to thinking… How many places have I lived? How many moves?

First, I suppose we should define what constitutes a move… I’d say where you’re moving your furniture from one place to another or are there for several months. Based on that criteria…

Whoa, 30 moves!!! And 12 different cities, excluding all the separate places we lived while roaming the world on our year-off sabbatical or during our home-free stint after the Silverlake house disaster, such as Buenos Aires, Rio, Skopelos, Rome, Paris, Montejaque, Desert Hot Springs, or while we renovated our house.

Whew, I’m tired just thinking about it! And very happy to finally be settled somewhere and typing this from the comfort of my cloffice while watching the baby sleep.

BTW, I’ve heard some very random — albeit glamorous — rumors about myself from others, such as I’m Frank Sinatra’s granddaughter. As you can surmise, my beginnings were quite humble. My first “room” was a crib in a closet in tiny Air Force Base housing. Maybe that’s why I love working from my cloffice?

While moving can be exhausting, it’s also made me very adaptable to many different environments. I have always loved moving, at least as an adult. It’s always fun to have a fresh start and a new adventure. Since being out on my own, almost every move was initiated by me — the only ones that weren’t were San Francisco and Detroit for Fred Baby’s jobs. Crazy, right?

Also interesting, Loma Linda was my first move as a baby, and is smack dab between LA and Palm Springs. While we have no family at all in Southern California, something keeps drawing us back to this area. #palmvivant

Now I’d love to know: How many places have you lived?

Do you love moving or loathe it?

Feel free to share your lists + totals in the comments!

p.s. Do you know anyone who has only moved five times? I feel like most people move that much in college alone. Another article said the average American moves 11.4 times. That seems more accurate, doesn’t it?